Sunday, September 30, 2012

Dick Randall, happy go lucky archetype of an American film
producer/ writer/actor, with a burning passion for low budget trash and sleaze
fare. Amongst his mighty catalogue of productions prowls some of the grittiest
dazzling and favoured exploitations flicks co-produced between the USA and
Italy, Spain, France, Philippines, Taiwan, South-Korea, Thailand and on and on
and on. I’ll say stuff like Guido Zurli’s Lo stranglatore di Vienna (The Mad
Butcher) 1971, Fernando Merighi’sCasa d’appuntamento (The French Sex Murders) 1972, Mario Bava’sQuante volte… quella note (Four Times that Night)1972,
Eddie Nicart’sFor Y’ur Height Only 1981 and Juan Piquer Simón’s Mil gritos
tiene la noche (Pieces) 1982 and you’ll probably find at least one title you
like, and then you have a perfect image of what Randall got up to in his thirty
years as producer of cheap and cheerful trash cinema.

If you’ve been keeping up with Mondo Macabro’s catalogue
these last couple of years, you will definitely have seen the names of several
Dick Randall produced movies, amongst them the more recently released gialloesque
sleaze thriller, The Girl in Room 2A.

A pretty grim initial attack – during the opening credits,
talk about being effective - eagerly sets the tone, as a young woman is
kidnapped by masked strangers, drugged, striped naked, strung up to the beams
of a roof, tortured and then tossed off the side of a cliff to her death…
There’s no doubt about it, from here on this movie is probably going to be on
the rough side.

In stark contrast to the violent opening, we’re introduced
to our protagonist Margaret Bradley [Daniela Giordano] as she’s released from
prison peacefuly chatting to the wardens. She goes straight to her halfwayhouse
under the supervision of Mrs Grant [Giovanna Galletti], claims to have been incarcerated
innocently, and that it all had been a mistake, which obviously makes her
backstory suddenly become intriguing. To thicken up the plot, there’s a lurky
geezer following her around, and installed in her temporary residence, she
notices a big blob of red – supposedly blood – that won’t wash out from the
floor of her room. Definitely lifting a trick of two from the Italian Giallo
genre, shutters slam, the landlady acts suspicious, footsteps stalk outside her
door at night, a character has a mannequin fetish, and a red gowned, red masked
figure haunts her dreams… but is it a dream?

By chance the landlady’s son Frank [Angelo Infanti], is in
cohorts with the sinister Mr Dreese [Raf Vallone] who takes an eager eye to
Margaret. There’s a little hook that keeps Margret from leaving the cooky
landlady and her snooping son, Margaret can’t leave before she’s paid the first
rent. So she need’s dosh too become free… With a small loan of twenty bucks
from her parole officer and friend Alicia Sundberg [Eurohorror icon Rosalba
Neri], Margaret starts to plan her move to freedom and escape from the
suspicions apartment of Mrs Grant.

Along the way, we learn just how vile Dreese and the man in
red can be, as they turns on a former business partner, torturing him and driving
him off a cliff in a burning car. The plot thickens when Jack Whitman [John Scanlon] turns up,
telling Margaret the story of his sister’s suicide. Edie Whitman was also the
previous tenant of Mrs Grant, and also a former resident of room 2A.

Jack ignites his own little subplot, which goes via Edie’s
boyfriend Charlie [Brad Harris], and his wife Claire [Dada Gallotti], who
clarify both Margaret and the audience’s suspicion that Mrs Grant’s hostel is
being used as a menagerie of victims for the Red masked man’s sadistic
pleasure. When Charlie tells Jack Edie ended up at Mrs Grant’s after a short
spin in prison, it becomes clear that Margaret better stay on her toes. Which
doesn’t stop her or the supposed mourning Jack from dropping out of heir
clothes and getting it off, whilst Frank peeps on them from the other side of
the curtains…

The threat against Margaret is pretty solid now, and gearing
up for the last act, the red hooded figure and his thugs make their grand
entrance.Chained up and locked in a
small cell in a dank chateau Margaret finally learns what the strange cult is
all about, and how they are the only ones who can help her, and the other” Bad
girls” repent their sins. It’s a small part, but Karin Schubert is featured as
Maria, yet another young woman to move into the Grant hostel, and as we have
already learned, bad girls must be punished. Subplots and main narrative all
come together in a final climactic encounter where answers are given and the
identity of the masked red figure is revealed.

The Girl in Room 2A never really manages to get up there
with the great Gialli, although it certainly does tap into genre traits and
relies heavily on something of an investigation plot. There could have been more
moments where nudity and violence come together, and the greater part of the
hooded man’s sadistic torture is told through flashbacks. It is a great moment
of depravity, and a quick internet search makes me wonder if there was an even
rougher cut of the film, as some seventies bush found on the net, isn’t
featured in the film. It could also be the classic publicity shot stunt, so
let’s not pay too much attention to that. I’d easily have seen more of it, but
despite being an important part of establishing the threat of the climax, it’s
pretty sparse. The opening premise certainly doesn’t come through even though
the final scenes have a great evil cult, complete with bourgeoisie audience in
attendance moment. If one this is underused, it’s the mystery of Mrs Grant and
the ominous cult!

Perhaps it is part of lesser Gialli traits, the sudden
stopping in it’s tracks and tossing a mediocre ending at the audience, as a lot
of them suffer from somewhat unsatisfying final solutions. The climax to The
Girl in Room 2A isn’t’ altogether satisfying and comes off as something of a
quick fix. I’m guessing that the lack of eroticism and sexploitative content –
which certainly was an area that Rose had tampered deep into back in the states
during the Sixties with scripts for several roughies and his direction of the
one with the best name ever The Smut Peddler 1965 -may be sign that Rose was trying to move into a new area, more
serious film turf and perhaps starting to sever his ties with the old smut
peddling sexploitation world. Whatever the case, his plans seemed to have
failed, and he unfortunately never made another film after The Girl in Room 2A.

The majority of the score is brilliantly haunting ambient
jazzy stuff by Berto Pisano - mostly known for his scores to Andrea Bianchi’s
Nude per l’assasino (Strip Nude for Your Killer) 1975, Le notti del terrore (Burial Ground: The Nights of Terror) 1981, and Mario Landi’sGiallo a Venezia
1979. But at the same time it takes on some preposterous proportions during the
last act and does more damage than help build towards the climax. I don’t know
what the through was at the time, but it almost becomes farcical with a cheesy
adventure matinee quality. Needless to say it sounds pretty daft in the context
of saving young naked women from a red masked person thrashing at them with a
cat o’nine tails.

Re-built using part of English and Italian prints to bring
the most complete version of The Girl in Room 2A, Mondo Macabro present the
film in the finest shape it’s ever been available in to date, uncut, uncensored
and unbound! It may not be the top of the crop, but it sure is an delightful
little piece that easily makes for some easy watching and the Red hooded sadist
is one of those characters you really cant get enough of and cherish every
moment of that scarlet insanity.

Monday, September 24, 2012

I knew nothing of the original movie when I first sat down
to watch Bereavement. If I had know that this was the second instalment in a
proposed trilogy – and a prequel - I most likely would have looked at it
through the “oh do we really need another sequel telling us where it all went
wrong movie” glasses. But that would have been wrong of me as Bereavement
stands completely on its own two legs and is somewhat unlike other explanatory
prequel movies in this genre. Instead of a road to ruin recap showing how all
the bad conditions shaped the monster, Bereavement presents a scenario of its
own through which the antagonist of the initial instalment merely figures as an
unfortunate victim instead of being the prime focus of the narrative.

“If they have no feelings they can’t know fear, but if they
cant know fear, why do they run?”

The above sentence is a mantra uttered by serial killer
Graham Sutter [Brett Rickaby] who resides in his families since long shut down
and abandoned Meat and Poultry processing plant. After kidnapping a young male
child of six years, Sutter starts to force his young protégé to watch a series
of disturbing moments of violent sadism. The young child, Martin [Spencer List],
is stricken with a mysterious condition that makes him lack emotion or feel
pain. A condition Sutter uses in his mental and physical torture of both Martin
and the victims he has chained to the roof of his torture chamber. In stark
contrast to the dark sinister realm of Sutter, we find the Miller family. Hard
working father Jonathan [Michael Biehn] who takes in his teenage niece Allison
[Alexandra Daddario] after her parents die in a tragic accident. The Miller’s
do their best to welcome Allison, and raise her as one of her own, and are the
complete opposites of Sutter. After spotting Martin lurking behind the broken
windows of the processing plant, Allison’s curiosity get’s the better of her,
and the contrasting families rush head on in a violent collision course.

Bereavement runs pretty smoth and effectively, despite
tapping deeply into TCM territory, which is hard not to do, when messing around
in this genre niche. It builds a fine tension between the good and the evil.
Martin doesn’t really have much activity in the major part of the movie, but
acts more as a supporting role to Sutter – who has some serious issues of his
own. From square one Martins “disorder”, which will come in handy in the
sequel… is introduced. His mother tells a nanny there on a job interview of his
condition, his fragility and his lack of feeling. It’s also used as a tool
against him later when Sutter slashes his face with a huge knife in front of
one of the unfortunate female victims. Sutter does this whilst delivering
philosophical ponderings along the lines of “don’t feel anything, because it
doesn’t hurt”. A complex approach as he torments Martin whist the poor victim becomes
part of his sadistic game.

The way Mena uses the contrasts of Biehn’s gentle all American
guy, against the raw sadistic way Sutter is raising Martin - making him watch as
he tortures and slaughters innocent victims, punishing him in tormentfull
ways, grooming him for the murders to come - is effective. One never knows when
Martin will snap and become what his destiny expects of him. Unfortunately there’s
many areas unexplored within the Sutter character, such as the strange demons
that haunt him, and the backstory between Sutter and Miller. Miller at one
point refers to the “stink” of Sutter who used to go to the same school as him.
There’s also the subplot concerning Sutter and the imaginary shape he sees
roaming the shadows. Unseen beings he refers to as “Them”, and also the beings he
claims control him, and demand the sacrifices he’s committing. Who knows,
perhaps that’s where the third instalment will reside.

There’s a witty pun the first time Martin sees Alison and
Sutter warns him “Curiosity killed the cat”. When Alison’s curiosity drives her
to seek out Martin in the supposedly abandoned processing plant later on the phrase
backlashes with a bittersweet irony.

I’d be lying if I said that I find Bereavement to be the most original
movie in the genre because it isn’t, and as I said earlier, it does tap into a lot of other genre classics for inspiration. Then again not to many movies in the niche do come up with something unique to add. So where the upside lies, is in the way it stays
away form many of the pitfalls others have tumbled into when trying to introduce backstory into a franchise. I also find it works much more efficiently if the audience, instead of reading it as a
straightforward genesis of a “madman” film, interpret it as a study of the parallel
lives of Martin and Alison. They both are challenged with the same obstacles –
trying to fit in to the new lives they have ahead of them, and not really
belonging. They both try to run away from the lives they are being forced into
– in their own very different ways. The movie comes to a climax, when Alison as
a character develops from a self centred teenager to a person who risks her own
life to rescue others. Martin also changes character, from the passive character
he is throughout the movie, to a most active character in the last act. It's also between the two youngsters that the dynamics of the film rests, and where the tension is built to that final climax.

Although it still is the telling of what drove Martin to
become the character he is in the first part, Malevolence, it’s the path
taken to that point which is of interest. It does indeed build a fine tension
as to which way Martin will go at the last act, considering the sinister
grooming Sutter has forced upon the young child. One could say that the victims
along the way are anonymous and their deaths never really mean anything, but
when the shit hit ‘s the fan and the movie goes all in survival horror, the
pace picks up and the punches start to take. The way Mena presents characters
is a worthwhile investment and he reels the audience in effectively in this
dark and suspenseful horror. At the end of the day, this certainly wakes an
interest in the original movie – which is elegantly woven into the final scenes
of Bereavement - and what will become the final part of the trilogy.

Monday, September 17, 2012

Franco, Rollin, Herzog, EuroHorror Fever Dream… you got my
full attention right there with those key words. I only knew Chris Alexander as the guy who gave
Fangoria the vital CPR the publication was in desperate need of. I also
slightly know of our shared passion for EuroHorror and all it’s sub-niches. But
I knew nothing of his filmmaking ambitions. Ambitions that finally have come to
fruition with his debut feature set to be released by Autonomy
Pictures in Spring 2013.

Blood for Irina… yeah, Blood for Irina. For some reason that
made you think of Jess Franco films and possibly the female vampire Irina (as played
by Lina Romay), didn’t it. Well that’s quite possibly the intent of the title…
No wait, change that, that IS the intent of the title. Blood for Irina is a
passionate homage to the seductive cinema of Jess Franco, Jean Rollin and
several other European Art-house horror and sleaze auteurs. Yeah, Let’s talk
about them as Auteurs, because if you hold a burning interest in film, you’d
know that Auteur theory is all about the film reflecting the precise
creative vision the director had intended. Sans Franco, Rollin, Margheritti
etc, and perhaps it would be fair to jot down Chris Alexander’s name on that
list too. For regardless if they succeeded or not, the intentions where all about creating that perfect image of what they had in mind, and if so, then Blood for Irina definitely is the film of an auteur.

It’s a bold movie to make for a man so strongly associated
with above mentioned publication, as I’m sure this film will polarize it’s
audiences, and quite frankly alienate a lot of Fango readers. It’s not the kind
of movie one would have expected the chief editor of one of the biggest Horror
magazines to have come up with.

This is the story of three individuals and the paths they
walk, Irina [Shauna Henry] the vampire, who has come to an end of her time. The same blood she
craves is the same blood that is destroying her. The prostitute [Carrie Gemmell] who walks the
streets knowing that each abusive john may be her last and the motel manager [co-producer David Goodfellow] who holds dark secrets in his obsession for his longtime guest.

So many times I’ve read the tagline “in the vein of Franco, Rollin
etc”, and come to find none of it anywhere in the actual movie. It’s an easy way to pigeonhole a
film, but a lazy one. It takes more than a band of seductive fanged ladies in transparent nightgowns roaming abandoned château’s to reach the level
of poetry I associate with those other guys. As the final credit on the work print I saw
fades out – a dedication to Franco muse Lina Romay – I start going over my
notes to see if Alexander comes through on his premise, a “Eurohorror Fever Dream”.

He does and it’s easy to see that he knows his Eurohorror
(of which Alexander is an acknowledged expert on) The movie definitely ties in
with several of the traits I’ve come to familiarize as the traits specific for
the work of Jess Franco, Jean Rollin and I can understand why the press release
also mentions Werner Herzog.

Blood for Irina, connects through it’s gentle approach and
absentminded visuals – although I have a few issues with the repetitive slow motion.
The studies of decay, abandoned locations, and lack of interacting characters
all evoke the style so familiar, at times perhaps a bit to hard and almost
forcefully, but it does connect. But the motif that bonds the movie to the same
emotions of Rollin and Franco, is found in the themes Alexander uses. Returning
readers may be familiar with my studies of Rollin and Franco, where I talk
about the themes, motifs and referents that they used in their movies. This is
where Alexander taps into their hidden treasure. Instead of presenting a
generic vampire film, the movie deals with the themes of being abandoned,
solitude and the search for belonging, all in the same fashion as the directors whose
work he’s paying homage to.

Eerie images, abandoned beach, tormented souls, long
delicate shots, lingering on character faces, and a haunting soundtrack
(Written and performed by Alexander) all conjure up the recognizable traits
even if presented in a new, more contemporary setting. The power comes from the
dreamlike state the characters of the movie are trapped in. Within the
constellation of the three main characters, who are all in search of “something
else”; Irina in search of closure, the prostitute in search of something
better, the motel manager seeking to bond with his longtime tenant Irina.Their search takes a meditative path as they
slowly come together like driftwood on the abandoned beach that bookends the
movie.

Keeping a distance from the characters is tricky way to approach
a subject matter. We are accustomed to bags full of exposition telling us
everything and more about the characters before the movie gets going. It’s all
left out here, apart from slight backstory of Irina, but Alexander still
manages to produce emotions for his characters in the small acts of kindness
they do along the way. Irina comforts the hooker after a date turns sour, she
also gives the hooker a second chance, which directly turns victim to predator.
It’s an act of kindness that serves them both. It’s also an act that helps the
audience for the first time empathize with Irina.

The narrative is sublime, subtle and tender. Alexander never overtly clarifies what we are watching. Instead the approach taken is a suggestive one,
challenging the audience to place the pieces together. This is a film that demands attention from its audience. Sometimes the abundance of a
destination is effective, as the rush of insight when all falls into place is
much more efficient than characters moving on a predestined track. As said, the
movie demands it’s audience to pay attention whilst laying out the pieces.

A scene that may seem random at first, becomes an important
part when it falls into place later on generating a somewhat tender moment.
This happens on several occasions in the film. As when the Motel Manager find’s
a victim of Irina’s hidden away amongst the desolate beach houses. His acts are
of affection; he’s protecting his object of desire. In the obscure intimacy of
distance, the characters drift together through their search. It’s a meditative
and dreamlike approach, which certainly mimics emotions and traits of several Rollin
and Franco movies.

Blood for Irina is a passionate, dedicated fervor that walks
the thin line between life, death, fantasy and reality when three fates are
interwoven in an introspective state of mind. Not for everyone, but undoubtedly
something fans of minimalistic genre films will appreciate. I’d say it’s a
delightful appetizer for future projects to come from the mind of Chris
Alexander.

Blood for Irina was shot on a minimal budget, over a five-day
period in Alexander’s hometown of Toronto, and is set for a Spring 2013 release through Autonomy
Pictures. For more information on the film, check out Blood for Irina's facebook page and
Autonomy Pictures.

As the movie is still in post at the time of publication, I’ve
chosen to use publicity shots to illustrate the article. Images may not
represent the final tone and look of the completed movie.

Sunday, September 16, 2012

One of the few movies I’ve ever turned off because it got
to me in all the right ways, is the original
Amityville Horror from 1979. My wife and I tried to watch it way back when we
started hanging out in the nineties, and we just couldn’t make it through. It was way to scary
and it ended up being turned off and put back on the shelf. I’d seen the movie several
times before along the years, I’d even read Jay Anson’s novel which still to
this day has a fixed spot on my bookshelf amongst the other horror and pulp
books. It’s still the movie my wife rates all others we watch against. So, when
Amityville Horror 3D turned up in my mail the other night, a stiring urge to watch it grew inside me, as I recalled seeing the trailer, probably in the theatre I used to help out at when growing up, or on one of the many trailer tapes watched back in the advent of VCR. Anyway I recall it
hitting all the right marks and freaking the hell out of me - I was thirteen and still had a lot of really cool shit to discover. And keep in mind that there once was a time when a single image from a movie could
give you the chills, that goddamned Lutz house is an icon of fright if there ever was one...

Ghostbusting couple John Baxter [Tony Roberts] and Melanie [Candy Clark] expose a band
of charlatan mediums working out of the old Lutz house. Whilst
following up their story with some photographs in the basement, real estate
agent Sanders [John Harkins] turns up and presents John a great "on the spot" bargain: buy the house for
almost nothing. Being mid-divorce from Nancy [Tess Harper], John jumps at the opportunity, as
do the set-up’s. Photographs show deaths to come, demonic faces, swarms of flies gag the
uninvited, floorboards creak, holes in the basement groan, winds blow, stinks
stink, and teenage daughters complain about things way out of their league, before whipping out the old ouija board.

When it all comes around, Amityville Horror 3D holds nothing against the
original and it really is a
truly generic movie that tries its hardest to be unique. Unfortunately it just can’t stay
away from following in the footsteps of paths and tricks earlier treaded by Stuart Rosenberg and Damiano Damiani – not forgetting the very Omen II-ish elevator
sequence, and an old Indian burial ground - in earlier films. Now perhaps this is due to the fact
that parts one and two, are based upon “real events”, and this third
installation, is all make-believe. Because producer Dino De Laurentiis
was being sued buy the Lutz’s weren’t part of the second sequel, hence the make up story by William Wales, who seems to have never written anything else for films either before or since. But that doesn’t stop Meg Ryan, in her second
role ever, and Lori Loughlin - who will be forever associated with her character
Becky, John Stamos girlyfriend in the god-awful, never-ending, Olsen twin goo, Full
House - as the Baxter's daughter Susan, referencing the earlier events and movies that
took place in "that" house.

Nevertheless Amityville Horror 3D, tries it’s best to
be and entertaining little flick that get’s the job done. It builds up the
tension – or at least tries, as we already know everything there is to know
about the house and the “entity” living there. Just as I enjoy movies that poke
my mind and make me look over my shoulder an extra time, I enjoy movies that
demand nothing from me. I can just chill the heck out, be entertained and fall
in and out of sleep if I wish, despite a really cool John Caglione Jr. burn victim effect around midpoint.

Taking a peek at the storytelling, it's pretty straight forward. It's never said, but one can guess that John and Melanie are an issue, hence the divorce between John and Nancy. Perhaps in an extended universe, they hook up again and make it work as the ordeal in the house brings them back together. But there's not much dimension to characters, and not really anyone that one empathizes with either. It's pretty flat and in several ways it plays as a rack-em-stack-em slasher. There’s also a splendid irony to the movie, as
sceptic and hoax buster John, finally turns to his previous team of assistant hoax
busters to prove that his house is indeed haunted. Cue demons and spooky
lighting.

Originally shot in 3D, Amityville Horror 3D host several
moments of that amusingly bizarre theatrically overacted scenes and moments to make
the three-dimensional effects pop out. Stuff being held a tad too long, up
front of the camera. Poses held a bit longer than necessary. Objects moving
slightly slower than normally, you know, it's the goofy stuff that makes
eighties “revival 3D” such a blast. Like the Friday the 13’th part III : 3D 1982 opening credits, where names and title stab out of the screen…it gets the job done and it’s all
in good fun. Some really great moments are spittle towards the audience, iron
pipes though a windshield a Frisbee, a stuffed swordfish and my favourites, a
rotting corpses and demons jumping out of a hole in the basement.

The Njutafilms release, out now, comes with an option of
normal, or migraine inducing 3D viewing (glasses included) - which is something of a rarity for this title! Go get it, you know
you like dorky eighties horror with special, special effects.